Fun! With! Felt! Celebrating the holidays with Simplicity – Pt 2

Posted on December 10, 2013 by almondrock

Oooh Christmas is getting nearer! I don’t know about you but I’m humming silly festive tunes, wrapping gifts and gravitating to foods with ginger or cranberry in them.

As you know I’m sewing up various items from Simplicity 1516.

First it was the Christmas ornaments… now a lovely Christmas stocking.

In case you’ve forgotten, this pattern includes templates for the following festive felt decorations: a tree skirt with happy characters, a stocking with pocket, and hanging ornament animals including a squirrel, bear, fox, snowman, moose and owl. There’s also the suggestion to turn the animals into wall hangings.

(The plan was to show you the tree skirt next but I’m sorry, my parents haven’t got their tree up yet so you’ll have to wait to see it in all its cheeky glory.)

So… Stockings!

You might say, why do I need a pattern for a stocking? Well doesn’t it just take all of the hassle out of the measuring and thinking out the instructions?

My stocking is made from red and green felt. I love the pocket and cuff; I feel like they add a simple charm to the finished item. For me, the template creates a good size stocking that I have filled with three medium gifts (one in the little pocket).

I also added white scallop topstitching which is one of the few decorative stitches my machine has. There is a velvet ribbon hanging loop that is caught in the cuff seam securely.

And finally I personalised my stocking for its recipient by adding a monogram; as this will hold the gifts I’ve got for my Brother’s girlfriend.

I think this is super cute and only took me 20 mins to make. And actually, I stopped to make a cup of hot Ribena in the middle of construction so probably less than that! The instructions are clear and consise and produce a neat finish on the cuff and pocket. If I have time, I might rustle up a few more.

What do you think? Are you making a stocking this year?

Now I’m off to quietly hum “All I Want For Christmas” and hope my fella doesn’t hear me. That’s the Christmas song he hates the most!

Fun! With! Felt! Celebrating the holidays with Simplicity – Pt 1

Posted on December 1, 2013 by almondrock

That’s right, I’ve been having Fun! With! Felt!

In my head I’m saying this like Sheldon’s intro to “Fun With Flags“.

Simplicity got in touch with me to see if I wanted to help spread some festive cheer. I was allowed to pick any of their holiday-themed patterns to sew and I’m here to share the results with you all.

I was so close to picking Simplicity 2495 – but I got scared of showing my terrible embroidery skills.

Instead I went for Simplicity 1516!

I’m going to show you my makes over two posts. Today I’ve got the cutest Christmas Tree Ornaments to show you.

This pattern includes templates for the following festive felt decorations: a tree skirt with snowflakes and happy characters, a stocking with pocket, and hanging ornament animals including a squirrel, bear, fox, snowman, moose and owl. There’s also the suggestion to turn the animals into wall hangings.

First up – Mr Snowman! With cute coal eyes/buttons and a carrot nose. I especially love the stick arms.

Next, Fantastic Mr Fox! With shifty fox eyes and nifty fox feet. This might be my favourite.

Now because I don’t like to follow rules you’ll see I’ve made a few adjustments.

Here is Gobblett the Turkey! I made him using the body and eyes of the squirrel. The feet are the arms of the snowman. I drafted the tail fan, beak and wattle.

Finally here is Rudolph! This is the body, nose, eyes and antlers of the moose but with a self drafted belly and red nose. I also tweaked the shape of the antlers a smidge.

All these characters were made with felt, pva and machine stitching, though they could easily have been hand-stitched. I used wadding to plump them out a little but they barely took any stuffing.

All the arms, legs and ears are caught between the two layers of ornaments so they look as good from the back as they do the front.

The beauty of these little critters is that they can be a completely child-friendly make. What kid wouldn’t like to sit at a table and make animal ornaments with goofy faces?! A supervising adult could help stitch them up and then pass back to the kids for stuffing. If your child is a little older and trustworthy, they could quickly use a running or blanket stitch round the outside to assemble the bodies.

The patterns pieces are colour coded (see above – 10s, 11s and 12s) so you know which pieces need to be cut out of black, white, etc. Everything small is provided twice to cut single-fold, so you get two mirrored feet, antlers, etc. Word of warning: the eyes, pupils, and nostrils are pretty darn small and you could probably just wing them freehand.

Soon I’ll be back to show you the stocking I’ve made to put some small gifts in for my family and a tree skirt that will be going round my parents Christmas tree (rather than my hilarious small one).

What do you think? Are you smitten? Or not a fan of felt ornaments?

The Little WHITE Jacket

Posted on November 25, 2013 by almondrock

Finally I have put my fledgling couture skills to good use!

My Mum’s couture cardigan is complete and it had its first outing this weekend.

Some of you will remember that earlier this year I took a class with the Yorkshire School of Sewing to learn how to make Vogue 7975 using couture techniques and benefit from the instructor Gillian’s wealth of fitting experience.

I was sewing a little black jacket with black grosgrain trim. Well I’m ashamed to say that is still sat at home, 90% complete.

I am not ashamed to say that everything I learnt was well worth it for use on this gorgeous jacket for my mum.

We used white bouclé with multicoloured woven crosses from iconic fabric heaven Linton Tweed; Gold satin lining from Jack’s Fabrics; Gold trim and buttons from Birmingham Rag Market.

These are the skills that were involved in producing this beauty:

pattern-matching/aligning the colourful woven crosses
underlining each piece
hand-basting then quilting the lining to the shell fabric
hand-sewing all the various lining seams down
inserting a neckline stay
mitred corners
adding weighting to the hem
catch-stitching chain in place by hand
hand-sewing the trim around the edges

There is also a fake placket at the wrists and fake pockets, all decorated with trim and buttons. We also added tiny hooks and eyes to close the jacket but mostly this is going to be worn open.

We divided the work so that I would come over during the day, help as much as I could and then on the evenings I’d leave my mum homework (usually hand-sewing lining). She took the jacket over the finish line by hand-sewing all the trim and buttons. What a super star.

And I think she looks fabulous in it! It’s the perfect length and style for wearing with jeans like she is here, and to pair with dresses.

Taking a class is an excellent way to learn the techniques for making a realistic couture cardigan and Gillian is wonderfully patient so if you’re based in or near Yorkshire she definitely gets my endorsement.

I’ve also heard excellent things in passing about Claire Shaeffer’s new book with enclosed instructional DVD but have yet to see any complete reviews for it.

If you’re wondering why I keep saying couture cardigan and not dropping the CC-bomb it’s because of this thought-provoking blog post.

And in case you wish to revel in my failure but learn a few things at the same time here are the links for my previous LBJ posts:

Part 1, Part 2, Part 3, Hopefully one day I’ll write Part 4!

The Jackson Pollock splodge dress

Posted on November 22, 2013 by almondrock

I just finished a pretty little number.

The fabric is a Liberty tana lawn called “Melly”. You might recognise it from Elise’s tulip sleeved peplum blouse.

It’s a bit of a sad little tale really. I wanted so desperately to pair this lovely fabric with some black shiny buttons and decided the Deer and Doe Sureau would work excellently. I was also going to add black contract bands of ribbon to the skirt and sleeve hems.

But in my eagerness to press ahead I didn’t realise that the waist measurements I’d used to grade my pattern weren’t quite right. Curse you, biscuits! I ended up with about 5/8 ” of a gap where the side seam wouldn’t meet (*shakes head in horror*) and there was not enough seam allowance to let it out.

I had a good half metre of the Melly cotton left so I thought I might be able to squeeze something out of that but the Sureau pattern pieces were just too big. Instead I turned to my trusty Simplicity 2444.

The pattern pieces fortunately fit on the remaining fabric and I cut cap sleeves out of the Sureau full sleeves, that had been rendered useless. I kept the Sureau skirt which is a bit slimmer cut when you compare to my previous 2444s.

I love how from a distance this fabric looks so delicate, almost floral but up close the paint splatter effect is brilliant. I feel like a walking Jackson Pollock painting.

The sleeves made this version feel quite different to my other Simplicity 2444 dresses (I’m pretty sure this will be my last for a while now though). But as I’m sure you’ve noticed I took them off. They were a teeny bit too tight for all the dancing I was planning!

Only the skirt is lined this time, in a bright blue polyester and I inserted a side zip to give myself a new challenge. This may be my best “centred” zip insertion to date; I think this is due to me marking out in air-erasable pen where to sew rather than following the grain of the zipper alone.

Do you think the dress lacks a bit of punch? It made me feel sad that I ended up having to make a different dress to the one I had in my head but overall I’m happy.

I wore the dress to my friend’s wedding at Chevin Country Park near Otley, paired with red satin ballet flats, a fabulously gaudy silver necklace that forms a big knot, a matching silver handbag and since it is November, a black wool cardigan. Plus curls, because y’know they’re muchos fun! I think I possibly should have also worn a belt to supply some contrast. I made a black bow belt but it came out looking too twee and didn’t have a bought belt that fit the bill.

So there you go! My last Simplicity 2444 for a while. I should probably hide the pattern from myself right?

Minerva Mosaic Skirt

Posted on November 17, 2013 by almondrock

I couldn’t wait any longer to show you this amazing and eyeboggling skirt!

Minerva Crafts and The Sewing Directory have been teaming up for the Minerva Blogger Challenge. Sewing Directory post various Minerva products on their site and bloggers are invited to email and say what they’d make from it.

I entered to make something from their new range of premium cotton prints!

I originally chose the safety pin fabric but it was too popular and sold out. So my back up was this lovely colourful Mosaic print.

My plan was to make a dress and I decided the weight and drape of the fabric would work well with the Belladone dress. There isn’t really a predominant colour so I went with purple for my contrast binding and topstitching.

Now a lesson learnt is that you can’t sew bias binding around a neckline, then unpick it all and expect to redo it like nothing happened. I totally stretched out my neckline!! Beyond saving as well. I was so sad and didn’t have any spare fabric to work with. I mean look at this gorgeous binding that has gone to waste. The topstitching on my first go was appalling though (think “drunk monkey”).

Determined to not waste this lovely fabric, I decided to follow up on my plan to try a belladone skirt.

It’s super easy to do, you just make a waistband facing and use a shorter zip. I had a perfect size purple invisible zip in my stash too!

Ok so a bit more about why this fabric deserves the name “premium”.

The fabric didn’t bleed at all. Not remotely! Surprising given the vivid and various colours in use.
The weight and drape is what you expect from the high quality cotton you see in shops like Backstitch, Frumble and Fabric Rehab but without the same price tag.
Minimal creasing. I love wearing cotton but I hate looking like a crumpled mess by the end of the day. Even though it would be hard to tell in this print, I wore this skirt all day at work. That’s a lot of sitting on trains and at desks and in meetings but the skirt barely creased.

Now I just need to wait for that safety pin fabric to come back in stock so I can buy myself some. Yippeee.

Thanks Minerva!